Friday, December 16, 2016

Imbroglio around the arrests during an operation against the ETA – The World

The honorary president of the League of human rights, announced a time as one of the arrested, explained to ” the World “, it would have to be on the premises to participate in a voluntary approach of the group to disarm.

The confusion on the night of Friday 16 to Saturday 17 December, after the operation conducted by the police forces of the French and Spanish against the clandestine organization and basque separatist Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) in Louhossoa, in the Pyrenees-Atlantiques.

sources close to the matter, cited by the news agencies, reported the presence of the honorary president of the League of human rights (LDH), Michel Tubiana, among the five people arrested. Attached to the phone with The World in the night, the lawyer explained that he was not present at the scene during the response : ” I would have had to be there “, he however said.

Mr. Tubiana was to participate in what he described as ” a voluntary approach to the ETA to disarm “. The weapons were to be ” offset “, before being ” later delivered to the French authorities “.

It is unknown at this stage, the precise identity of the people arrested, so that some sources had claimed that he was the leader of the environmental movement, Bizi !, Jean-Noël Etcheverry said Txetx, the former president of the Chamber of agriculture of the basque Country, Michel Berhocoirigoin, a cooperator vineyard in the appellation of the basque Irouléguy, Michel Bergougnan, and the journalist Beatrice Haran-Soft.

Mr. Tubiana, for its part, simply stated that among the arrested individuals are ” two members of the civil society “ also engaged in the peace process.

Seizure of weapons and ammunition

The police operation, on a commission of the anti-terrorist prosecutor in Paris, has been carried out by detectives from the French police, in particular of the directorate-general of internal security (ISB), the brigade research and intervention (BRI) of Bayonne, and police officers from the elite unit RAID, assisted by police officers of the Guardia Civil Spanish.

The arrests were carried out in an isolated house in the town of Louhossoa, on the road from Bayonne to Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques. During a search, the ” a large seizure of weapons, explosives and ammunition “ has been carried out, details of the French ministry of the interior. Paris and Madrid welcomed the arrest ” individuals in relationship with the terrorist organisation ETA “.

Read also : The basque Country is wary of the separatism

Michel Tubiana sees in the arrests of this Friday, ” the will of the French and Spanish governments to transform a voluntary approach in a decision “. the ” It is a communication operation “, he laments : ” If the authorities were informed, they could not ignore that the approach was that of a neutralization [of the weapons]. “

He adds that several attempts have been made to ask the French authorities to determine the physical conditions under which the entire arsenal of the group could be ” offset and handed over “. Attempts remained without result, according to him.

” disarmament Process “

Shortly after the announcement of the transaction, the nationalist basques had also given this version of events. The site Mediabask, close to the daily Spanish basque Gara, which expresses sometimes the positions of the ETA, published a letter that he had addressed to Michel Tubiana, Txetx and Michel Berhocoirigoin.

after this mail, they had decided ” start the process of disarmament of the organization and proceed to the destruction of an initial stock of weapons “, that is, they say, “approximately 15 % of the arsenal” of the group. All three are justifying their action by their willingness to ” to contribute to a future without violence and democracy the basque Country “.

Several nationalist movements consider that ” the fonts French and Spanish have prevented the destruction of the weapons “ and call for a response in a demonstration planned for Saturday to Saturday 16 hours to Bayonne.

Campaign of bombings

On October 12, 2016 a large cache of weapons to the ETA had been discovered in the forest of Compiègne, in the Oise. On 5 November, one of the last leaders of ETA, still in hiding, Mikel Irastorza, was arrested in Ascain, near Bayonne, and then indicted and jailed in Paris. On the 14th of December, another militant basque Spanish has been arrested in Marseille. Again, it was joint operations, fonts, French and Spanish.

in The name of his struggle for the independence of the basque Country and Navarre, the ETA – which means basque Country and Freedom, carried out a campaign of bombings that caused the deaths of 829 people, according to Paris and Madrid. The 1980s were the most bloody.

In October 2011, the organization has renounced definitely to the violence, but it has not since returned its weapons and refuses to dissolve. The ETA claimed that it negotiation with the States Spanish and French on the fate of its roughly 400 members held in both countries, the authorities refuse.